August 27, 2012

The Spanish galleon Nuestra Señora de Atocha wrecked on the Florida Reef on September 6, 1622, after being caught in a hurricane. It was one of eight ships of the Tierra Firme fleet lost that day, in what was one of the worst tragedies of the Spanish maritime empire. The Mel Fisher Maritime Museum commissioned artist and model-maker Dan O’Neill to recreate the moment the Atocha struck the reef and began to sink. Utilizing the available historical and archaeological information, O’Neill crafted a model that captures the fateful moment with all its dread and horror. It is not your typical ship model! The model is on display at the Mel Fisher Maritime Museum in Key West, Florida.Video Rating: 4 / 5

Mel Fisher’s Treasures and the Mel Fisher Maritime Museum have joined together to initiate a project that will allow all Mel Fisher Lifetime Achievement Award winners’ handprints to be displayed in one central location, the Mel Fisher Museum Courtyard. The Mel Fisher Lifetime Achievement Award is presented annually to a person who has shown incredible perseverance in accomplishing a life-long goal, which motivates and inspires others to do the same. This person is also someone influential in the life and ambitions of Mel Fisher himself. Wooden boxes have been constructed in the courtyard in front of the impressive display of anchors in the courtyard. The handprints, along with a plaque, will be displayed in concrete molds within these wooden boxes . Mel’s handprints have been im mortalized in concrete at the Schooner Wharf Bar since 1998 along with other Mel Fisher Lifetime Achievement award winners from the first few years. To begin the project we felt Mel’s handprints were the most important to have on display. The debate began about how to mold his hands in order to transport the imprint to the museum courtyard. In collaboration with Monica Brook and Corey Malcom , we employed the same methods used years before to mold the markings of a silver bar. The pictures and short video clip below follow this process. It attracted quite a bit of attention from Schooner Wharf patrons on one hot July afternoon. We will follow up with pictures of Mel’s handprints as they are put on …Video Rating: 0 / 5

February 5, 2012

Tom Gidus metal detects for lost treasure on the San Miguel De Archangel shipwreck off Jupiter Inlet, FloridaVideo Rating: 4 / 5

Winter Park, FL — Daniel Frank Sedwick, LLC has just opened their Treasure and World Coin Auction #10 for bidding, closing live on the Internet in four sessions on October 25-26 (Tuesday-Wednesday), viewable online at www.Auction.SedwickCoins.com. Of the 1400+ lots in Sedwick’s latest auction, more than 240 lots are gold coins from around the world. Over 100 of these are gold cobs, most of them comprising The Santa Fe Collection of dated Bogotá cob 2 escudos, a landmark reference collection of over 50 different dates, showing changes of styles and assayers over the 130 years of their production, including several “first and finest knowns.” “The Santa Fe Collection was carefully formed within the past decade with an emphasis on clearly visible dates,” says firm owner Daniel Sedwick. “Misreading partial dates has created much confusion in this series, which this educational collection will serve to clear up.” But the single most important gold item in the sale is a Brazilian gold monetized ingot of 1832, cast at the Serro Frio foundry under Emperor Pedro II, a very late and exceptionally rare example with its original foundry certificate (known as a guia). “Every time one of these Brazilian ingots comes up for sale it is a major numismatic event, and ours has reason to be even more so,” says Sedwick’s assistant Agustín (Augi) García, emphasizing that less than 10% of the known ingots still have their original guias. Other significant pieces of gold in the auction include: a …Video Rating: 5 / 5

January 15, 2011

On the island of Assateague, along the seacoast of Maryland and Virginia, there is a breed of horses that has run wild for centuries. Legend says they originated from a long lost Spanish galleon. This centuries-old tradition is remembered every year when 50,000 tourists descend on the island of Chincoteague to witness the annual pony swim and auction. On September 5, 1750, a Spanish warship named La Galga drove ashore on Assateague and came to rest close to shore and partially submerged. Her cap

“In real life-especially off the Florida coast-things can have fatal consequences. Fatal Treasure is a truly compelling read.” -Aphrodite Jones, New York Times bestselling author of Cruel Sacrifice and All She Wanted

In 1622, hundreds of people lost their lives to the curse of the Spanish galleon Atocha-and they would not be the last. Fatal Treasure combines the rousing adventure of Ship of Gold in the Deep Blue Sea with the compelling characters and local color of Midnight